Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'd also like to thank the three witnesses for their presentations, as well as all those who went out of their way to be here this evening.
I'll go ahead and warn the interpreters that, even though I'll be speaking French, I'm going to use the English term “first past the post” because it's faster to say and packs a bigger punch than the French term “système uninominal majoritaire à un tour”.
This special committee was given a mandate to study the issue of an alternative voting system for the Canadian federation. The Prime Minister was very clear during the election campaign. He said that the 2015 federal election would be the last such election under the first-past-the-post voting system, and the reasons for that are obvious. The system creates false majorities and significantly distorts the true will of the electorate, Canadian voters. These false majorities misrepresent the will of the people. Election results no longer reflect the reality, the choices people have made, or their desire to have their voice represented in Parliament.
Ms. Michaud, you are proposing a mixed member proportional system that would partly resolve those issues while maintaining the link with a local elected representative, something everyone wants. But there are a number of ways to do that: through provincial or regional lists or through larger ridings—perhaps not for Yukon—with three, six, or seven members per large riding.
Which of the two systems do you prefer?